Add MS 45299-45309

WILLIAM MORRIS LITERARY MANUSCRIPTS. Vols. III-XIII. Drafts and copies of tales and poems for The Earthly Paradise (see C.W., vols. iii-vi). The work was published 1868-1870, but was begun much earlier. In C.W., xxiv, p. vii, May Morris gives the dates 'About 1865-1870' for 'Poems of The Earthly Paradise time', but in C.W., iii, p. xvi, she dates an early MS. of The Man born to be King in the period of 'Scenes from The Fall Of Troy', which is fixed at about 1857 both by her (C.W., ii, p. xiv) and J. W. Mackail (The Life of William Morris, i, p. 166), implying that material for The Earthly Paradise was being worked on as early as this. The final printer's MSS. mentioned in C.W., iv, p. ix, are not in this collection; consequently all these MSS. differ to a greater or lesser extent from the versions printed, with the exception of those which were not printed until after Morris's death. May Morris's introductions to C.W., vols. iii-vi, xxiv, contain much information on the MSS.; she discusses their relationship to the development of Morris's style in Morris, i, pp. 396-436.